4 minutes with… Andrew Holt, Director, Catal International

Tell us about your company and it’s role in the Advanced Bioeconomy.

Contract R&D Organization in Catalyst Technologies developing Catalysts and Catalytic Processes for waste and Biomass upgrading. Development of conversion technologies for Pyrolysis derived oils.

Tell us about your role and what you are focused on in the next 12 months.

R&D director working in the area of developing commercially viable heterogeneous catalysts and catalytic processes for upgrading all forms of waste organic materials with emphasis on utilisation of Carbon Dioxide in upgrading technologies and processes

What do you feel are the most important milestones the industry must achieve in the next 5 years?  

Commercially acceptable process to convert and upgrade domestic waste.

Of all the reasons that influenced you to join the Advanced Bioeconomy industry, what single reason stands out for you as still being compelling and important to you?  

Complex chemistry involved

Where are you from? 

Lancashire, UK

What was your undergraduate major in college, and where did you attend? Why did you choose that school and that pathway?

Chemistry, University of Manchester Inst of Science & Technology

What’s the biggest lesson you ever learned during a period of adversity?  

Keep fighting

What are 3 books you’d want to have with you, if you were stranded on a desert island

Translation of ‘ Os Lusiadas’

R.F.Burton ‘ Travels in Arabia’

The Perfumed Garden

What books or articles are on your reading list right now, or you just completed and really enjoyed?  

Ted Allbeury ‘ The Long Run’

What’s your favorite city or place to visit, for a holiday?  

Moscow.